DEATHLOOP (16 page)

They lay back finally, like star fish, trying to get their breath, but still he felt a rush each time she brushed against him, with her hand, her leg. Zack grabbed her and off they went again as though the satisfaction they felt already had to be compounded. At five o’clock they gave in to sleep as the sounds of chambermaids and trolleys began drifting in from the corridor outside, but they slept soundly now wrapped in each other’s arms. No nightmares this time, Veronica slept better than she had all week.

By the time they left their room it was mid-morning and the breakfast buffet had long since been cleared away. Hungry now after their exertions they checked out and went in search of a greasy spoon. Over breakfast Veronica insisted on their finding the hill path to Crag Moor Fell. She had picked up a leaflet about it from the hotel and it looked great fun she said. Zack wondered what on earth could be fun about a crag or a fell, but kept these thoughts to himself as Veronica was clearly fired up by the idea.

He loathed all this fresh air stuff and started praying for rain, then they could find another hotel and have sex again, which is all he could think of right now. Veronica looked up at him and smiled, and he smiled back, but it was a guarded smile, the smile of the defeated he decided, because Veronica was in the driving seat now and he hated it. Here was a woman who could destroy him at a stroke, simply by doing to him what he had done to so many others over the years, by leaving him to a flapping, gasping death and then chucking him back into the sea.

The route up to Crag Moor Fell was not for the faint hearted. And as they struggled on the ascent, Zack found himself wondering why on earth he had suggested the wilds of Derbyshire for their rest cure. If he’d had his passport he would have suggested Las Vegas – bed, booze and fruit machines, by far the better option. This hill climbing was not his thing at all. His very expensive handmade shoes were looking bedraggled now, and after the trials of the last few days when any kind of physical activity had been out of the question, he felt unfit, as though he’d spent the last few months holed up in a working men’s club and had just popped out for air.

Finally, they made it to the summit where self-satisfied groups of people in plastic anoraks, hiking boots and thick flecked socks admired the view – admittedly a rampant landscape that fell away dramatically beneath them. But they stood out amongst this crowd, Veronica, looking as she did like a Parisian model, and Zack looking like a matinee idol. It was as though they had taken a wrong turn somewhere and fetched up there by mistake.

“Well,” said Zack, eventually, “I suppose there’s nothing for it but to go back down again.”

That afternoon Zack’s prayer was answered and rain fell, so on Veronica’s recommendation, they dropped into a little cinema and watched some old black and white film that was one of her favourites. Zack was happy to oblige, despite acknowledging the fact that the archaic melodrama on offer was the usual load of tosh that women got enthused about.

It took him back some years to an endurance test of a film called ‘The Piano’. He’d got a bit sick of hearing women rave about it and so nagged by his then girlfriend he’d agreed to give it a try. Made by women for women no doubt, it was Zack’s idea of hell. It took ages to get to the sex scene, the precursor being this Maori character with long hair and a dodgy accent, hiding under a piano running his finger round holes in a mute’s stocking. More tedious a piece of drivel he had never come across, but to be fair, on the way home, his girlfriend said that if she was taken to see The Seven Samurai by a bloke once more, she’d turn gay.

For some reason, Veronica wanted to go to a small mill town called Renfield, 30 miles away. Zack made no objection, wondering how she knew so much about Derbyshire suddenly, until Veronica revealed a whole swathe of these damn tourist leaflets she had picked up along the way. Zack hoped that the next few days would not entirely be given to dragging around from one beauty spot to another with very little time for sex in between. So they set off. The half-hearted little showers that had sent them scurrying into the cinema looking like small fry now compared to the onslaught that was lashing against the car.

“I love the rain,” she said, her eyes alive with it all.

Zack loved it too. With a bit of luck it would remain like this for the duration, which meant they could stay in bed the whole time and not pretend that they were actually interested in any of this countryside bullshit which was already beginning to irritate the hell out of him.

It was nearly 7 when they found themselves a mile from their destination. The rain had got into its stride and was now torrential, causing Zack to reduce his speed in this winding country lane, high up on the side of a hill. The wipers barely able to cope, Zack was on the verge of suggesting they just pull up somewhere because the conditions were unnerving him. Then, through the deluge, Veronica saw a small road sign pointing left, ‘Renfield’ the sign read. The Mercedes screeched, halted, backed a little way, then Zack threw the steering wheel and they continued along a smaller road now, but thankfully away from the sheer drop of the hill face.

Just as they were about to drive under a small stone bridge clothed in scaffolding, the engine of the Mercedes cut out, light died, like someone had flicked a switch, then a crack of pure white lightning forked right across the sky.

“Hell,” said Zack.

“What’s happened?” said Veronica, “why so dark suddenly?”

Zack looked up to the bridge in front of them, and although the view was obscured by rain spattering the windscreen and the sudden loss of light, he saw something move.

“Get out of the car Veronica!”

“What?”

“Get out of the bloody car!”

Like the arc of a javelin in flight, a scaffolding pole tipped free of its restraints fell from the bridge and punctured the windscreen of the Mercedes cleanly, ending up at the back of the passenger seat, shattered glass cascading into the car with it. The pole shifted a bit, as though getting comfortable, then came to rest, one end exactly where Veronica had been sitting, the other thrusting out over the bonnet like a fishing rod. Standing on either side of the car Zack and Veronica were drenched already, but it didn’t matter, they felt lucky, extremely lucky. Neither of their phones would work, so there was nothing else for it. They took one bag from the boot, stuffing in a change of clothes, and set off. Through the downpour, they saw sparse lights in the distance and continued walking towards them.

No one was out on the streets of Renfield, only Zack and Veronica, their shoes squelching, their clothes heavy with water making the simplest movement difficult. There was one real light in the town and that spelt out the words ‘Guest House’, although the ‘o’ was missing, a more welcoming sight Zack thought he had never seen. They struggled towards the slate grey building and pushed open the door, shaking themselves on the porch like Labradors and kicking off their shoes. Another door led them into a cosy reception area carpeted with red and gold swirls.

An obese middle aged woman sat behind a poorly constructed reception desk, watery blue eyes peering out from pebble glasses. A sign on the desk read “Proprietor: Mrs L. E. Fairweather”. The woman looked at Zack and Veronica as though they’d just dropped in from Mars.

“Yes?” she said, managing to sound completely disinterested in the possibility of a reply.

“Please say you have a room available,” said Zack, “car trouble, so we’re a bit stuck as you can see.”

Mrs Fairweather swapped one set of glasses for another then slid a large reservation book from the side of the desk until it was exactly in front of her. She took an inordinate amount of time to do this before opening up the book, glancing down at a page, and then turning it over. Zack noticed that there was nothing written anywhere on the page that was headed with that day’s date, nothing at all.

“How long would you require accommodation?”

Zack wanted to say for as little a time as possible love, but he resisted. “Just tonight would do us.”

Mrs Fairweather snapped her book shut and leant back. “Two night’s minimum,” she said.

“Fine,” said Zack, “we’ll take it.”

Mrs Fairweather, who found courtesy irksome at the best of times, made no attempt to disguise her contempt. She knew the kind of people these two were, people who would never in a million years stay in her guest house under normal circumstances, who would look down their noses at it in fact, but who were prepared to put up with it tonight because they were desperate and because they had nowhere else to go.

“We do not accept credit cards, debit cards only, or cash, and the bill has to be paid now in advance, and breakfast is included if you take it or not.”

“No problem,” said Zack.

Mrs Fairweather took her time digging out registration forms and changing her glasses once again, as though enjoying the delay, knowing she was causing them more discomfort than was necessary.

“We very much appreciate this, you’re a life saver, and such a lovely place,” said Veronica, glancing round at the seriously naff decor, hoping good old flattery would do the trick.

But Mrs Fairweather knew their game. People like this thought she was lower classed, ignorant and malleable, and that a few choice words would get her to perform like a seal, but she was no one’s fool and presuming otherwise was a mistake. She decided to double the fee to get her own back.

“Three hundred pounds then,” she said, expecting a flicker of dismay at least, but Zack refused to give her the satisfaction. The tariff was up on the wall and so he knew what she was doing, but right at that moment he would have paid anything to get warm and dry.

Mrs Fairweather was even more disgruntled now that the financial arrangements had not even raised a brow with these people who clearly had money to burn, and very much wishing she had had the nerve to go for four hundred and be done with it.

“Is there any food available?” asked Zack, knowing exactly what her reply would be even before he spoke.

“No, nothing till morning now,” she said, pleasantly, with a ghost of a smile.

“Toast or anything like that?”

“
The kitchen is closed
,” said Mrs Fairweather as though putting a lid on all this food nonsense once and for all.

Through an open door Zack could see the kitchen from where he stood and so it wasn’t closed obviously, and the toaster was there on the work surface as large as life but he knew it was hopeless, he knew this woman took great pleasure in denying people things, it was probably the only pleasure she had left.

Mrs Fairweather struggled on the stairs, out of breath within seconds and wheezing. She led them right to the top of the building to a tiny attic room with a sloping roof. They all knew this was the worst room in the house, and they also all knew that she had chosen it even though there were other, much better rooms lying empty on the floors below. Zack was on the verge of saying something but he caught Veronica’s eye which told him to leave it, that it was one night after all and it would do. Mrs Fairweather said nothing, tossing the keys on a chipped old plywood dressing table before lumbering off.

“Bloody hell,” said Zack tearing at his clothes and grabbing a thin, cheap towel from the shower cubicle, about to launch into a diatribe.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Veronica with a smile, “it’s fine.”

Zack grabbed Veronica and hugged her. He felt so lucky to be with this woman who had trudged across the Derbyshire hills in horrendous conditions, wet through, cold, miserable, without a single complaint, and once or twice in fits of laugher at their absurd predicament. Now here she was in this grotesque rabbit hutch of a place, and still she hadn’t lost her sense of humour, Veronica French had to be the best person on earth.

“You get in the shower first,” he said.

“Let’s live dangerously and both get in.”

So they climbed tentatively into the tiny plastic cubicle which creaked and groaned at their weight and stood beneath a feeble dribble of warm water, encased by grubby tiles and dingy, lime scaled enclosures.

“Oh this is ridiculous,” said Zack, struggling to get any power at all from the prehistoric shower unit.

Veronica burst out laughing, then Zack did, then they found themselves unable to stop and they became hysterical. It had been Veronica’s intention to make love to Zack in the shower but in the confined space it was uncomfortable and it didn’t work, so Zack left her to it, getting in himself a little later.

They were dry now and in fresh clothes, happy in their little room, although Zack kept hitting his head on the eaves, making Veronica laugh. They lounged on the bed, Veronica pulling out a soggy leaflet from her bag.

“What time is it?”

“8.15,” said Zack.

“Perfect.”

Veronica admitted that the main reason she had been keen to come to Renfield was because there was quite a well-known spiritualist church just off the main street, and there was a service there apparently, that night. She asked Zack casually if he’d heard of it. To say Zack looked crestfallen would be something of an understatement. He just stared at her and said nothing hoping she would pick up the vibes.

“A friend of mine died last year, I’d just like to know she’s okay, that’s all.”

Of course she’s okay Zack wanted to say, she’s dead and as okay as she ever will be so why waste time checking up on her, and anyway what will you do if she’s not? Climb up Jack’s beanstalk and sort it out? He was angry now thinking he’d been hoodwinked into coming to this blasted place. He’d just gone through enough spooky stuff to last a lifetime and here was the woman of his dreams suggesting more.

“You’re not serious are you?”

“Of course I am, and look,” she said, jumping up and peering out of the window, “the rain has stopped.”

It hadn’t stopped, Zack noted, but it was on the wane.

“Trying to contact the dead is a waste of time, Veronica. They can’t be contacted, and you know why they can’t be contacted? Because they just so happen to be dead, that’s why.”